Insulating coated wire and method for manufacturing the same

Abstract

An insulating coated wire includes a center conductor and an insulating coating. The insulating coating has a bending auxiliary section in which the thickness of the insulating coating is smaller than that of the other portion, and that has a shape in which at least a part thereof protrudes outward in the radial direction. The bending auxiliary section has a shape that facilitates bending of the insulating coated wire by elongation deformation thereof. This insulating coated wire can be manufactured by arranging, on the circumference of an insulating coated wire material, a metal mold that has the inner surface including the section having a shape protruding outward in the radial direction, and forming the bending auxiliary section in the shape along the inner surface of the metal mold by heating the insulating coating within the metal mold and generating a pressure difference between inside and outside of the insulating coating.

Description

TECHNICAL FIELD[0001]The present invention relates to an insulating coated wire that is to be arranged in an automobile or the like, and a method for manufacturing the same.BACKGROUND ART[0002]An insulating coated wire includes a center conductor and an insulating coating that covers the center conductor. When such an insulating coated wire is arranged in an automobile or the like, the insulating coated wire is used while being bent at an appropriate position into the shape that is suitable for the arrangement position. However, an electrical wire that has so large a diameter that a high current flows therethrough, such as an electrical wire that connects battery terminals arranged close to each other, has the problem of not being able to easily be bent due to the high hardness of an insulating coating, and making the wiring operation difficult.[0003]As means for solving this problem, Patent Document 1 discloses a method including the steps of removing a coating material from a port...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

[0006]It is an object of the present invention to provide an insulating coated wire that can be bent at an appropriate portion without requiring a troublesome operation and a complicated structure, and a method for making it possible to easily manufacture the insulating coated wire.

[0007]An insulating coated wire provided by the present invention includes a center conductor, and an insulating coating that is made of an insulating synthetic resin material and covers the center conductor. The insulating coating includes a bending auxiliary section that is formed at a part in the axial direction thereof, and has a thickness in the bending auxiliary section that is smaller than that of the other portion, the bending auxiliary section having a shape in which at least a part thereof protrudes outward in the radial direction of the insulating coating electrical wire, and that facilitates bending of the insulating coated wire by elongation deformation thereof.

[0008]Furthermore, a method provided by the present invention is a method for manufacturing the above-described insulating coated wire, the method including the steps of preparing an insulating coated wire material that includes a center conductor and an insulating coating that is made of an insulating thermoplastic resin material and covers the center conductor; arranging a metal mold on the circumference of at least a part in the axial direction of the insulating coated wire material, the metal mold having an inner surface that has a part having a shape protruding outward in the radial direction with respect to the outer circumferential surface of the insulating coated wire material; and forming, on the insulating coating, the bending auxiliary section that has the shape along the inner surface of the metal mold, by generating a pressure difference in which a pressure inside the insulating coating is higher than a pressure outside the insulating coating within the metal mold in a state in which the insulating coating is heated within the metal mold to a temperature at which the thermoplastic resin material constituting the insulating coating is softened, the bending auxiliary section being such that an insulating coating thickness thereof is smaller than that of the other portion, and having a shape that facilitates bending of the insulating coated wire by elongation deformation of the bending auxiliary section thereof.

Problems solved by technology

However, an electrical wire that has so large a diameter that a high current flows therethrough, such as an electrical wire that connects battery terminals arranged close to each other, has the problem of not being able to easily be bent due to the high hardness of an insulating coating, and making the wiring operation difficult.

It is significantly troublesome to perform these operations at a place at which wiring is performed, and an improvement in efficiency of the wiring operation cannot be expected to be achieved.

Such a disadvantage becomes more serious as the electrical wire has greater number of portions to be bent.

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